Either DA councillors of the Sarah Baartman District municipality betrayed their party, or EFF councillors broke party ranks and voted in favour of an ANC mayor and speaker.
The ANC managed to retain the mayoral chain, with regional chair Scara Njadayi elected mayor and councillor Nomhle Gaga elected speaker on Wednesday.
They each received 16 votes out of a total of 30 council seats.
But as the ANC only has 14 seats following the November 1 local government elections, it needed the help of either the DA (12 seats), EFF (3 seats) or FF+ (one seat).
It is unclear which of the parties supported the ANC as the votes were cast by secret ballot.
Njadayi believes it was his talks with DA councillors on the sidelines that clinched his win, saying some had complained that they were unhappy with the candidate — Karen Smith — put forward by the DA for the mayoralty.
Speculation was rife, however, that two EFF councillors broke party ranks and supported the ANC.
EFF leader Julius Malema made it clear that the party would not support any mayoral candidates put forward by the ANC.
The party was on a mission to destabilise the ANC everywhere, including councils where it governs with a slight majority.
EFF provincial chair Yazini Tetyana said they were probing the matter to ascertain if any of their councillors backed the ANC candidates.
“We are aware of the matter, but at this moment we still need to do a proper investigation to find out what happened and after that we would be able to comment,” Tetyana said.
Njadayi said the ANC went to the council meeting on Wednesday on the back foot.
“We did not [waste] our energy and effort to speak to the EFF as they made it very clear where they stood.
“So we looked at the DA and FF+ after picking up that there were internal disputes,” Njadayi said.
“We engaged the EFF at the provincial level but they told us they were taking direction from the national level and the decision still stood.
“We thought we were going to lose, but we picked up the displeasure within the DA on the basis of the preferred candidates for mayor and speaker, and we started to negotiate with some people in the DA and they assured us they will support the ANC on condition we don’t divulge their names,” Njadayi said.
“We did not want to entertain DA politics but we wanted their people to ascend the ANC into the position of authority, which they successfully did.
“When the results came, it meant those we were talking with in the DA were not lying.
“However, we will cement a relationship with all political parties.”
Smith dismissed Njadayi’s claims, maintaining that all their DA members voted for the party’s candidates.
Njadayi said people had already written a political obituary for the ANC, but the party’s priorities for the next five years were informed by the ANC’s manifesto.
“The first thing that the president [Cyril Ramaphosa] emphasised is that we have to commit ourselves to work with the people and work for the people and stay away from things that taint the ANC and focus of the reconstruction of the ANC,” he said.
The provision of water will be the main focus of the new administration, as well as ensuring all the towns within the Sarah Baartman municipal district are clean.
The district covers the municipal areas of Makana, Dr Beyers Naude, Blue Crane Route, Ndlambe, Sundays River Valley, Kouga and KouKamma.
“We are focusing on ... growing the economy and we will work with businesses so we can create jobs,” Njadayi said.
Njadayi said they would commit to appointing competent officials who met the requirements and not on the basis of friends but academic qualifications.
The leadership would also commit to fighting gender-based violence. .
“We also plan to work with [the Nelson Mandela Bay municipality] in making sure at some point we exchange ideas due to the fact that we share boundaries,” he said.
He said they wanted to ensure that development projects also came to the Sarah Baartman district and they would continue to maintain a good relationship with China, which is a trade partner.
Smith said the party noted the priorities mentioned by Njadayi in his acceptance speech on Thursday.
“We will now focus on being an effective opposition and we will keep him and his executive to account.
“The outcome today was very close,” Smith said.
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